Friday, October 27, 2017

I
was fortunate to chat with Peter Capaldi last night at the 2017 CWA Dagger
Awards in London; but not about Dr Who, but about his portrayal of the Spin
Doctor from Hell - Mr Malcolm Tucker, a character created by writer Armando
Iannucci.

Malcolm
Tucker follows the British Tradition of making comedy from the grotesque, the
very odd and pompous, like Captain Mainwaring [Dad's Army], David Brent [The
Office], Alan Partridge, Leonard Rossiter's Rigsby,
Frank Thornton's Captain Peacock, John Cleese's Basil Fawlty - to name some of
the most outrageous exaggerations of the Eccentric British Bloke.

Though
for me, Malcolm Tucker as played by Peter Capaldi is seated at the apex of the
absurd - sheer genius.

I
thanked Peter last night for making me laugh so loudly, so deeply, when i
watched the BBC "THE THICK OF IT", and the feature length film
version IN THE LOOP, which satirized the British / American special
relationship, and the commencement of the Iraq War.

Sometimes
comedy is how we cope with tragedy, and someone has put IN THE LOOP onto
Youtube, in HD - and the link is below [so if you want a deep belly laugh, as
well as understand how weird our world is, see link below]

IN
THE LOOP is probably one of the greatest political satires, so brilliantly
written by Armando Iannucci, but how Peter Capaldi crafted Malcolm
Tucker......sheer absurd genius.

ENJOY
- BUT A WARNING / IT CONTAINS BRITISH HUMOUR AT ITS MOST EXTREME, ESPECIALLY
LANGUAGE PROFANITY AND ABSURDITY

Pater
Capaldi was amused when I told him, that my own vernacular and use of colorful
Anglo-Saxon expletives was heavily influenced by his portrayal of Malcolm
Tucker.

And
as Brexit [UK leaving the EU] is in the opinion of many people [me included],
the supreme folly, a self-inflicted wound, economic &bureaucratic hell - an
example of how some people can be manipulated with miss-information, lies and
pandering to base emotion, not logic - then in this very British tragedy I turn
to Armando Iannucci and to Malcolm Tucker as he debates Brexit
with an equally absurd creation of Iannucci - Mr Alan Partridge.

Sunday, September 24, 2017

Some people
comment and query upon how come I have such a good memory. The older I get the
more important an active memory becomes, for memory is a critical aspect of
thinking, cognition, and therefore how we see the world. It also helps manage
(for me) the Anxiety of Existence; the randomness of 'Being' and combatting
negative, depressive and dangerous thinking.

The process
of cultivating a sharp and extensive memory is not easy, it requires effort and
an organisation of the thought processes. This effort, this cultivation, &
activation of 'Memory' not only requires the managed and lucid recall of 'good
& insightful' past events, but also the management of bad ones too. It also
requires constant maintenance, as well as an awareness of how the memories we
keep, morph and distort as we reflect, re-interpret as well as rationalise what
we construct as reality, our existence, and who we share it with.

Ultimately
memory also helps explain 'who we are' - by the context of our existence from
our memories.

I smiled many
years ago when I stumbled upon a book by Jonathan Spence, about Matteo Ricci. At the risk of emitting
a loud clanging name-drop; I came across this work from my correspondence with Thomas
Harris many years ago, when I asked him about Dr Hannibal Lecter's ability
in drawing (with charcoal) The Duomo
[The Cattedrale
di Santa Maria del Fiore], from Florence (from Memory as he didn't
have a window in his cell) while incarcerated in Baltimore. Harris told me that
Dr Lecter's Memory sprang from this book on Ricci, which he would later name
check in the footnotes of 1999's much misunderstood (and from some quarters
much maligned) HANNIBAL.

This Sunday
morning the house is silent. My wife Muriel is at the Gym. Our eldest daughter
Sophia has gone into work of her own volition, as like all the Karims' - we
work hard. Our Son Alexander is in Malaysia to view the upcoming Grand Prix
with friends and our youngest daughter Miriam spends her first day at
University, in Hall.

I am alone in
bed, with my thoughts.

Last night we
hit traffic (Sophia, Muriel and I) returning back from moving our youngest
daughter to University. There were road closures, diversions, it was bad biff.
We argued in the car as we were tired and after a long and emotional day, we
were stressed leaving the youngest Karim to fend for herself in this weird
reality we share.

At one point
while bypassing the Sat-Nav (which had gone rogue) Sophia said 'Dad you are
weird, you think weirdly' it made me silent as that observation made me ponder.

Yesterday our
youngest daughter Miriam presented me with a gift from her recent travels in
San Francisco - as we ate a meal, part of the ritual families do when they
part, she passed me over a gift, a small square piece of plastic, with a
microchip embedded beneath the surface.

The gift was
a device called ‘Tile’ that links
your keys, IPhone to a computer. It attaches to your key-ring and has a button
that makes your phone ring if you've misplaced it, so you can find it. Miriam
said 'so it will help you, if your memory fails'

I smiled at
the word memory.

Sure, I touch
my bulky key ring (which also acts as a defence tool) many times in the day,
feeling its comfort in my trouser leg (during the day) and now (thanks to
Miriam's gift) it can help me locate my IPhone, if I misplace it.

The 'Tile
device' is small and attached to my key chain, so i feel the white plastic gift
from my Daughter all the time, and I mean all the time. So several times of the
day, I will think lucidly about our youngest Daughter Miriam Karim, because of
this 'Tile', now part of my defensive key ring - something I see and feel
throughout my 'conscious' day, as it comforts and is a tangible part of my
realty; and makes me think about Miriam when I see or feel it.

Though Miriam
thought that she gave me a practical gift (from her vacation in San Francisco)
to ensure I always remembered my Iphone, but in reality it will be my way of
thinking about her every day, and several times, having the comfort that there
is in what we remember; in our Memory.

I also have
items on my person, that remind me of my Wife, my Eldest Daughter, my Son as
well as my Mother, Father and two Brothers.

This memory
technique, the solidification of memory (the recall of days now passed) by
physical touch / association to provoke thought - (among other techniques) was
noted in the book that Jonathan Spence wrote, based on the life of Matteo
Ricci; the same book that Thomas
Harris told me about; the same book that helped him flesh out the character
of Dr
Hannibal Lecter - his remarkable memory.

So as I
pondered upon the comment my eldest daughter Sophia said last night as we
battled traffic adversity 'Dad, you're 'Weird' and which my Wife added 'Yes,
you do think in a weird way' - I now smile, as I'm glad I think the way I do,
for with our thoughts, we make the world as Buddha once conjectured and Rene
Descartes confirmed, for 'I think, therefore I am'

I like weird;
enjoy your Sunday, and perhaps some of us may purchase a charcoal stick and
draw an image, something that resonates, something from what we term a memory,
of a day now passed, perhaps of that Duomo, that Dr
Fell would later view after fleeing Baltimore - and perhaps we'll fold it
and place in our wallets, to remind us of the beauty contained in this world;
to protect our thoughts and distract them roaming over all that scares us in this
random and weird place.

"Typhoid and Swans, Officer Starling, they come from the
same place"

Dr
Hannibal Lecter, Baltimore, Maryland

More
information about THE MEMORY PALACE OF MATTEO RICCI by Jonathan D Spence
available Here

Monday, July 24, 2017

“There are so many more
important things to worry about than how you're perceived by strangers.”― Dennis Lehane

I have some sad news, due to a personal decision I had to
take [several weeks ago] and one that makes me very sad - but first let me
share something that made me very happy this weekend, during this year’s Theakston’s
Crime-Writing Festival [hosted in the wonderful city of Harrogate in England].

Some know of my early championing of the writing of
Dennis Lehane back in the 1990s. I recall vividly the attention his 1994 debut A
Drink Before the War gathered including winning the Private Eye Writers
of America [PWA] Shamus Award for best PI Debut. But it wouldn’t be until his
second novel landed on my desk Darkness Take My Hand that I
realised that a writer of considerable power had arrived.

Incidentally his British Publishers at the time Bantam /
Transworld used the ‘as good as Thomas
Harris or your money back’ line as a marketing tool which first attracted my
attention to Darkness Take My Hand.

Incidentally, I spoke to Lehane about this remarkable
sophomore work, as well as the significance of titles in general a few years
ago –

Ali I
heard one of your earlier novels Darkness,
Take My Hand was originally titled Cold, Cold Heart but you changed it because of a novel
with the same title by James Elliott [a pen name of J.C.
Pollock]. Have you had other changes of title?

DennisYes, well spotted. I’ve had a few title
changes, for instance Shutter
Island I was originally going to title The Barrens, then I found out that Joyce Carol Oates had a book out with the same title. The
Given Day was originally
going to be A
Country at Dawn, but I decided that
title sounded a little pretentious, however I discovered that The Given Day has been published
in several countries under that title, such as France; my French publishers
liked that title.

During that time, I devoured his work finding merit
especially in Gone, Baby, Gone; Prayers
for Rain and Mystic River; Shutter Island - for they provoked deep thought, as they told
their exciting stories examining morality and acting as mirrors to view our own
thinking; our own value systems. My enthusiasm for Lehane’s Patrick Kenzie and
Angela Gennaro PI series was very high so I used to write to Dennis via his
wonderful literary agent Ann Rittenberg who kindly
passed my letters to him [as did Morton Janklow earlier when I used to
correspond with Thomas Harris]. Dennis kindly
signed bookplates for me as I would buy many paperbacks of his work, and glue
the signed bookplates inside [to motivate reading] and pass them to friends,
family and colleagues as gifts – as I love sharing work that moved me, and
wanted to spread the word, supporting the best of the best.

Dennis Lehane was a writer that helped me get through
some interesting periods of my life. The Irish Catholic backdrop of Boston
mirrored my own experiences in Dublin, as my family has links to Southern
Ireland, so I felt some resonance in his work.

Years later, work such as Mystic River,Shutter
Island, The
Given Day would spark my cognition and that of many other literary
commentators, with the moral dilemmas that their denouements presented the
reader as part of the narrative journey unfolding and challenging the reader’s
value system.

I felt the same feelings toward his latest work Since
We Fell when I read this interesting novel, for it promoted deep
thinking and it also challenged my own liberal value system -

There are sections of
writing in Since We Fell that stop
you in your tracks; make you contemplate your own life and situation and that
of others, for Lehane’s narrative is peppered with insight and questions. There
is humour but it is cloaked over the veils that cover the characters.

Dennis was over as one of the Guests of Theakstons
Crime-Writing Festival, during which he was in conversation with Mark
Lawson. Though it
would be the opening comments that Dennis made to the packed audience that made
me realise that not only is he one of my favourite writers of literary
thrillers, but also that he is a very decent human being, and one brave enough
to speak his mind, articulate what some of us feel about the new American
political regime, under Donald Trump.

Mark Lawson after introducing Dennis
Lehane to the Harrogate crowd, opened his questioning with “so as an American, let’s get the obligatory
Donald Trump question out of the way – so Dennis, what are your thoughts about
Donald Trump as US President?”

Dennis laughed, and made his feelings clear about Trump
and his cabal who reside in Washington. He added that he feels most sadness [and
I quote] at what the people with Brown
Skins are currently experiencing thanks to what Trump and his people are
doing. There was much clapping by the
audience at Lehane’s candid response, which later would touch upon many aspects
of what Trump, Bannon and the so-called ‘alt-right’ have whipped up in terms of
making some feel free to be unpleasant to others - who do not have white skin.

He said though he knows that America will survive this period,
as he believes in the principles that the country stands for, and despite all
the flaws – America will survive Trump.

Later that night I chatted with Dennis privately, and
thanked him deeply for being a brave man, and standing up for some of us who
feel anxiety with Trump and his supporters feeling they have been issued a mandate
to be hateful to others. I know many writers who avoid mentioning their
feelings about Trump publically, for fear of alienating their readership, as
many people voted for Trump, and may secretly agree with some parts of what he
stands up for.

“Bring Back Coal” – yeah, right. We are indeed in a strange
time.

But not Dennis Lehane – he is fearless for in a packed
room, he spoke up for the underdog. In a crowd that looked close to a Thousand
[or maybe more] there were less than a handful who wore Brown Skin, like me, but
he spoke up for us. There are other writers who share via social media the propaganda
from Breitbart, FOX and other right wing ‘news’ outlets, throwing in epithets
to stir up fear and hate - and I know some privately share the same views as
Trump [….I’m not a racist, but……].

In a democracy, freedom of speech is something I applaud;
but enjoy it while you can for Trump is an Oligarch, not one who celebrates the
democratic process and will attempt to dismantle it, like he is trying to
destroy healthcare for millions.

I realised after Harrogate, that not only is Dennis
Lehane one of my favourite writers, but he’s also a very good man – for as
Anglo-Irishman Edmund Burke once said –

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is
for good men to do nothing.

Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did
nothing because he could do only a little.

So I come full circle.

Following the magnificent Theakstons Crime-Writing
Festival, many were asking me in person [as well as on social media] “so excited for Bouchercon Toronto and planning
to meet-up” – for which I smiled, though I have told only a few people that
I will not be attending. It
took a long time to make this difficult decision – namely to not traverse the
North Atlantic for the foreseeable future.

I know a great number of people, so am sad at missing Toronto
Bouchercon and this decision was one that I did not take lightly.

This is very sad for me, as I studied in North America
and loved the country despite all its imperfections as it struggles to live up
to its ideals; but now my love affair with North America is on hold. My
decision is not related to religious issues as I am a fervent atheist, but it
is all to do with the issues I have endured over the years at American Airports
which my various friends and travel companions have witnessed. I have always
remained good natured, laughed off indignity with the people who have jobs to
do, but knowing that some appear to enjoy some aspects of their roles a little
too avidly.

I totally understand the serious need for enhanced
security at places of mass transit, especially commercial passenger aircraft,
but when enhanced background checks are available, each and every time I wish
to cross the Atlantic Ocean, I get additional attention and experience unpleasantness.

I have put up with the casual as well as not so casual
racism [including physical violence] since childhood, and usually get over
unpleasantness retaining my dignity and moving on and not dwelling on the
hatred in the eyes of some.

But no longer, because some people who share this reality
feel that now we’re in the era of Trump and Brexit [“we got our country back”; yeah, right], there are some that feel
they have a mandate to be hateful to people who are not
White-Anglo-Saxon-Protestant. There have been cases at Airports, words and
actions I have witnessed that have made me come to this difficult decision.
I’ve seen people pulled off flights, detained or held for questioning because
of something ‘others’ may have said.

During the flight, when you have brown-skin you feel
self-conscious going to the toilet, or when you need to get another book from
the overhead locker – you see people’s faces, and their eyes tell you much, and
then there’s the overt unpleasantness, spoken just loud enough so that the
speaker ensures you’re within earshot to hear the comment.

I used to laugh it off, and smile ignoring the hostiles and
ignorant among the crowd.

At my age now, I am not prepared to put myself in a
position where the opinion of a random stranger can embarrass or hurt me, or
result in me missing a flight or result in detention while ‘we check things out’
- because as Dennis Lehane once said “There are so many more important things
to worry about than how you're perceived by strangers.”

The level of ignorance I see around me is baffling as the
ranks of the under-educated and manipulated grows. I don’t wish to embarrass or
put my travel companions in an awkward position – when they see what’s going on
as I get pulled from the queue, or what to say when they hear an unpleasant
epithet uttered with the brown skinned bloke within earshot. Many times my travel companions have waited
for me at the airport, as I have been detained, my luggage swabbed and much
else on both entry to the US, as well as returning to the UK, or overheard the unkind
words from some, as well as feeling self-conscious on the flights.

The most unpleasant was an episode at Baltimore Airport in
2008 on my return to London that was witnessed by my travel companion at the
time Roger Ellory; and which I wish not to detail here as dignity is a keyword
to me. Some close friends know the tale, which I highlighted the absurd and
amusing aspects – to hide the fear of what could have resulted.

I totally understand today’s need for robust security,
and as I am no longer prepared
to go through this again; it posed a huge dilemma for me. I am a Board Member
of Bouchercon, and have been since election in Long Beach in 2014 and I enjoy
the relationship with my colleagues on the Board who are all very decent,
hardworking people, all supporting the genre on a pro-bono basis as Bouchercon
is a non-profit fan organization.

We all pay our own way.

So I have decided to cease
transatlantic travel for the foreseeable future, despite the video-conference
calls – I do not feel I could fulfill my obligations to the Board by not
attending annual Bouchercons as I have done for some time now.

So last month with a sad heart I
composed my letter of resignation to David Magayna, Chair of the Bouchercon Board, as well asking him to share
my letter with the wider Board. I passed personal apologies to Janet Costello
and Helen Nelson the co-chairs for Bouchercon
Toronto 2017 as I had paid my registration [and I know this year the event
is being held in Canada not America] – however I have decided for the foreseeable
future I would not be taking North-Atlantic journeys.

The personal messages I have received from my colleagues on
the Bouchercon Board since my resignation have moved me; including some that brought
me to tears as I feel sorrow at not being with the team – But they all know
where I am, and my helpful nature should any of them need any help from me in
the future.

Please understand, I am not being a prima-donna ballerina; I
totally get the need for robust security at Airports - but at my age, I am not prepared
to put myself though the hell of mass-transit when as a brown-skinned person, I’m
open to be vilified by the ignorant around me – as there is an agenda out
there, and some of us do not feel welcome; because I do not require validation
by strangers, as I like to ensure my own dignity is maintained.

So from now on my travel will be restricted to Europe, for when
it comes to visiting North America, I’m “Gone, Baby, Gone” to quote Dennis
Lehane, an insightful and elegant writer, but also a very decent person.

And I have a family who worry about me, then a deadline on a current
novel project to complete by October, books to read and evaluate from other
writers & publishers, as well as comment upon; because for every Dickie
Greenleaf, there is a Tom Ripley in the shadow.

I only wrote this as I know so many
folk who attend Bouchercon annually, and who I enjoy meeting up with, and I
wished to explain why I won’t be coming to Canada this fall / autumn.

Tuesday, July 18, 2017

It has been
reported in both psychological as well as medical research that a feeling of
awe; a sensation of wonder helps our immune systems. It also promotes a sense
of well-being [physical as well as mental]; it also increases our empathy
toward others – as it makes us think about our place in this reality, and
question our existence and that of others.

“That sense of wonder we feel in the presence
of something vast that transcends our understanding of the world.” They point out that people commonly
experience awe in nature, but also feel a sense of awe in response
to religion, art, music, etc.”

Though, as life
is a cognitive
sine-wave for we have to manage the ups and downs in our lives – the highs
and lows of our experience of reality – there is an opposite to our sense [or
feeling] of Awe – namely the feeling of
dissatisfaction. This has to be managed too, as it also has an effect upon our
immune systems, as well as empathy toward others, but negatively.

Having a once-in-a-lifetime peak experience
can lead to an unexpected blasé feeling of dissatisfaction. Peggy Lee sums
up the malaise you can feel in the aftermath of a peak
experience in her song, "Is that All There Is?" The song was inspired by the
existential story Disillusionment by Thomas Mann.

Managing the
sine-wave of our feelings can at times be tricky, for after an intense period,
or after a feeling of Awe, it can be hard to manage cognitively – for often we
feel a vacuum within or a feeling of disillusionment in consequence.

Recently I have
been awed [in fact stunned would be a better word] by three films though
marketed as Horror; the real horror within these movies comes from what I term,
the Horror of our situation in this reality; and the fear of what we don’t
understand. These three films are examinations, reflections of being human in a
scary reality, where the horror comes from our situation, and is often cloaked
in the shadows and within our imaginations. They also provoke deep, deep
thought and contemplation.

The test of how
deeply a piece of film has affected me is usually how long I remain in the
cinema, or when the DVD finishes how long I sit immobile and lost in my
thoughts - as the credits roll.

The following
three films held me, lost in deep-thought as the credits rolled as I
contemplated the significance of what I just experienced – bathing in the sense
of awe with my thoughts swirling.

The effect of these films [like last year’s Midnight Special by Jeff
Nichols] remain within me; that feeling of awe with no sensation of disillusionment
– for they are food for the mind.

GET OUT

Get Out is a 2017 American horror film
written, co-produced and directed by Jordan Peele, in his directorial debut.
The film stars Daniel Kaluuya, Allison Williams, Bradley Whitford, Caleb Landry
Jones, Stephen Root, LaKeith Stanfield and Catherine Keener, and follows a
young interracial couple who visit the mysterious estate of the woman's
parents.

IT COMES AT NIGHT

It Comes at Night is a 2017 American
psychological horror film written and directed by Trey Edward Shults. It stars
Joel Edgerton, Christopher Abbott, Carmen Ejogo, Kelvin Harrison Jr. and Riley
Keough. This claustrophobic tales centers on a highly contagious disease that has
ravaged the outside world. Paul, his wife Sarah, and their teenage son Travis
have secluded themselves in a country home. One night they are awoken by the
sound of someone [or something] trying to break into their fortified home in
the dark forest.

PERSONAL SHOPPER

Personal Shopper is a 2016 French psychological thriller film written and
directed by Olivier Assayas. It stars Kristen Stewart, Lars Eidinger, Sigrid
Bouaziz, Anders Danielsen Lie, Ty Olwin, Hammou Graia, Nora von Waldstatten,
Benjamin Biolay, Audrey Bonnet and Pascal Rambert. It tells the story of Maureen [Kristen Stewart] a personal shopper in Paris for Kyra (Nora von Waldstätten),
a celebrity. She travels to European capitals to shop for her, buying clothes,
accessories and jewels. Her twin brother Lewis recently died from a heart
attack; they shared the same genetic heart problem. They were both interested
in spiritualism and believed they had connections to the spirit world.

With an honourable mention to a film from
last year that I still think about from time to time.

MIDNIGHT SPECIAL

Midnight Special is a 2016 American science fiction film written and
directed by Jeff Nichols, and produced by Sarah Green and Brian
Kavanaugh-Jones. The film stars Michael Shannon, Joel Edgerton, Kirsten Dunst,
Adam Driver, Jaeden Lieberher and Sam Shepard. The story revolves around Roy
Tomlin and his biological son, Alton Meyer, escaping from both the government
and a cult, after discovering that Alton has special powers.

These films are like
lucid dreams, they remain within my mind and I think of them and their significance
from time to time – for they gave me a sense of awe, one that that made me
think deeply as well as reflect upon something Stephen King once postulated in
his book “On Writing” -

Saturday, May 27, 2017

Doppelgängerfrom the German [literally
"double-goer"] is a look-alike or double of a living person,
sometimes portrayed as a paranormal phenomenon, and is usually seen as a
harbinger of bad luck.

Ever since I witnessed some mysterious
and frightening incidents as a child; something I still cannot explain, something
that I still think of from time to time – the role of the Doppelgänger has
always fascinated me, as well as acting as a warning to me, about personality, and
the dangers of existence.

Like many writers, I use pen
names and enjoy traversing the edges of personality, be it my own or that of
others. The reasoning is that most people are not who they present themselves
as; for we have facets of character that remain hidden - often to survive.

As
the 1980s were closing Stephen King's pen name Richard Bachman was exposed as
he battled the last stages of his alcohol and pharmaceutical misuse.

The
novel THE DARK HALF is from that time though rarely mentioned; with its surreal
story of Author Thad Beaumont a writer of literary fiction battling his Pen
Name George Stark's creation the disfigured and dangerously malevolent Alexis
Machine. George Stark wrote two ultra-violent and renowned pulp thrillers MACHINE'S
WAY and STEEL MACHINE that were far more popular commercially than Thad
Beaumont’s literary output.

I
recall King’s THE DARK HALF because like Donald Westlake, some of us have a little
Richard Stark in us, to help traverse the dangers in this world; but like
Nietzsche's abyss, when the inner Parker is revealed to others, the abyss that
is Parker looks back into you. The dark side of human nature is an evolutionary
necessity; but also a danger - one we keep locked away.

“The office women looked
at him and shivered. They knew he was a bastard; his big hands were born to
slap with, they knew his face would never break into a smile when he looked at
a woman. They knew what he was, they thanked God for their husbands, and still
they shivered. Because they knew how he would fall on a woman in the night.
Like a tree".”― Richard Stark, The
Hunter

Here's a few words I wrote for Jeff
Pierce's THE RAP SHEET when Quercus Publishing brought back Parker to the UK in
2007. Jeff featured a staggering outpouring in 2009 when Donald Westlake passed
away, and here's some thoughts from the Crime / Thriller Community from The Rap
Sheet Part One and Part Two

I
wrote at the time in 2009 when hearing of the passing of Donald Westlake -

"I first discovered
Donald Westlake thanks to the movie version of The Hot Rock with Robert
Redford, which led me to explore more of the Dortmunder books, as well as
muttering “Afghanistan, Bananistan” to strangers from time to time. But my true
love was the Richard Stark series featuring Parker. I loved the spartan style
of Stark, and was overjoyed when I read Stephen King’s tribute to Stark in his
brilliant novel about split personalities, The Dark Half. (“Anyway, for reasons
you’d have to ask Westlake about, he eventually stopped writing novels about
Parker, but I never forgot something Westlake said after the pen name was
blown. He said he wrote books on sunny days and Stark took over on the rainy
ones ...”) It was an apt tribute to a great man.

I only met Westlake once
when we came to the CrimeScene convention in London in 2005. I was humbled in
his presence, despite his modesty and gentle nature. I find it surreal that
when I heard of the awful news [of Westlake’s death], the first words that came
into my head were “Afghanistan, Bananistan,” which echoed as a lament for our
loss. I miss his words already, as the world just darkened a tad, knowing that
he is no longer with us.

Saturday, May 6, 2017

Some of my friends and colleagues know of my interest in the “Doppelgänger” [a ghostly duplicate of a living person, derived from the German term Doppelgänger, literally: double-goer].

My interest is both of times that I have been mistaken for someone else; as well as encountering Doppelgängers of other people that I know.

My current interest in the Doppelgänger stems from something I am writing, something that takes over much of my current thinking.

I have a few Doppelgänger tales, some that are seriously disconcerting [as anyone who has shared a late evening in a bar with me will attest to]. I will share one of my Doppelgänger tales here; but this one is an amusing anecdote from my recollections of days now passed.

It was early/mid 1980s, England. I’d just returned back from the American Midwest where I had been studying for a Doctorate in Chemistry. On my return, my Father had been livid with me [as I had given up a good job at ICI, Runcorn to further my studies in America]. He told me in strong terms that I had to get a job after ‘fucking around academia’ and messing up a career in Imperial Chemicals Industries [ICI].

The first job I applied for I got an interview straightway and headed to London, as they needed me to start immediately. I worked as a young Industrial Chemist, for a Chemicals Storage and Logistics company on the Thames [London and Coastal Oil Wharves Ltd], which I helped get into chemical processing with Automotive Antifreeze manufacture as well as Chemical blending.

The company had taken a stand at The European Chemical Trade Fair, hosted at Heathrow’s Penta Hotel. The Managing Director asked me to ‘man the stand’ over the three-day trade fair [as I was cheap, and he wanted to show off his young Chemist to his customers as well as attract new customers].

I enjoyed the few days
having a superb room in the Penta; and as I was single it meant I got all my
meals and drinks on account. Various managers from the company drifted in and
out of the Chemical Trade Fair, helping me man our company stand.

On the final night Martin Wells, our MD had organised a celebratory dinner in the Penta, with three of our managers and a dozen or so of his top customers. The affair was a long and enjoyable evening. I drank rather a lot of wine, followed by generous quantities of Gin. I needed very little encouragement as our long table was in celebratory mode after the Chemical trade fair. So after a few hours in the bar, it was time to say goodnight and farewell to my colleagues and our guests. I stumbled up to my room which was a feat in itself, due to the amount of Gin I consumed.

On entering my room, I was way too drunk to function correctly, so I just fell asleep on the bed in my suit, only loosening my tie. I noted that the red LED on the bedside clock-radio said it was past three AM. The next thing I recall was that I was dreaming about a ringing phone; or so I thought. The dream woke me up, and I realised that I was not dreaming at all, but the phone by my bedside was ringing, and ringing and ringing. I grabbed the receiver and as I pushed it to my ear, the clock-radio informed me it was coming to five thirty in the morning.

“It’s reception. Mr Karim, your taxi is here” said the voice on the line.

“I’ll be right down” I replied in my drunken fugue. Looking back, I don’t know why I hadn’t queried the call about an early morning cab. I knew Martin Wells and the other managers were staying in the Penta too; and we were leaving in the morning, but not at this fucking early hour.

Somehow I managed to navigate myself down to reception, where a perplexed Night Porter and Cab Driver [who was leaning on the reception counter] stared back at me; this dishevelled young Asian bloke staggering in a crumpled suit obviously as drunk as a skunk.

The Night Porter quickly swivelled his chair back to his computer and looked back at me and said “You are Abdul Karim of Egyptian Airlines?”

“No, I’m Ali Karim of London and Coastal Oil Wharves” I replied hiccuping and then running to the nearby toilet, as I felt my stomach heave in my drunken state as reality started to spin around me.

As I ran, I remember hearing the Cab Driver laughing “thank fuck for that, as I thought that cunt is flying the 0700 hrs to Cairo.”

Though strictly not a true Doppelgänger Tale; I have two more about a person, persons or thing that may be a true Doppelgänger of mine; but that’s for when I am in a bar late at night and someone wants me to follow Peter Straub’s gathering of old men, when one asks “tell us all the scariest thing that has ever happened to you.”

Until then, back to my writing, and the issue of coming
face to face with your Doppelgänger.

Saturday, April 1, 2017

I was recently reading that there are plans to remake the
Wachowski brother’s 1999 movie THE MATRIX, and then I learned that Martin Scorsese’s film
adaptation of Dennis Lehane’s novel Shutter
Island is being adapted into a TV series. The recent HBO reboot / reworking
of the Michael Crichton 1973 directorial debut Westworld was a remarkable piece of work, and proved hugely popular commercially despite its immense cost. What these works share in common is their
interpretation of what we perceive as our reality; something that most of us ponder
upon from time to time, as well as the purpose and reason for our ‘being’ here
on the third rock from our power source, our Sun.

My favourite
sub-genre of film and books are those that questions what we perceive as reality, of
which I have read many work as well as viewed many mind-bending films. Though The Matrix and its two sequels are
probably the most commented upon; I still have very warm feelings toward three
films that were released around the same time [before the Millennium], and
mined similar themes - David Cronenberg’s 1999 eXistenz Josef Rusnak 1999’s The Thirteen Floor and of course my favourite Alex Proyas’ 1998 Dark City.

Though
there are many, many others; but particular mention
should be made of Stanislaw Lem’s novel Solaris
which was first filmed by Andrei Tarkovsky in 1972 and remade / reworked in
2002 by James Cameron and Steven
Soderbergh.

Though the earliest recorded thoughts
that question what we perceive as reality can be traced to Plato’s Republic in
his “Allegory of the Cave”

In the allegory, Plato likens people
untutored in the Theory of Forms to prisoners chained in a cave, unable to turn
their heads. All they can see is the wall of the cave. Behind them burns a
fire. Between the fire and the prisoners there is a parapet, along which
puppeteers can walk. The puppeteers, who are behind the prisoners, hold up
puppets that cast shadows on the wall of the cave. The prisoners are unable to
see these puppets, the real objects that pass behind them. What the prisoners
see and hear are shadows and echoes cast by objects that they do not see.

Read More Here and
view a short Ted-Ed video on the nature of reality as seen via Plato’s Cave

Anyone with a basic understanding of Chemistry, Physics
and Mathematics will tell you that the world we perceive with our sensory apparatus
is a mere fraction of what is actually around us. Advancement in
technology is making us realise that there are many other aspects / forms
within the reality that surrounds us; and which we cannot detect from our
sensory apparatus - in the narrow bands of light, sound, taste, touch and smell
that we use to navigate reality. In fact we also know that we are now creating
our own realities virtually. In David Cronenberg’s 1999 film eXistenz, we see that the rabbit holes
of interconnected realities is deep, for in each of our artificially created
realities, the occupants create or engineer their own, and to quote Kurt
Vonnegut ‘and so it goes’; layer upon
layer of artificially created virtual realities.

As the relentless march of technology and science marches
on headlong, there are many reports coming that the reality we are experiencing
is far from what we see around ourselves, for perhaps Plato’s Allegory of the
Cave is correct. Reports that our reality is indeed a construct or a form of
artifice is coming from credible
sources, including these. There were interesting ripples in the
scientific community when Dr. James Gates Jr
explained that in his experiments in particle physics and string theory, he found a form of
computer code; strings of One and Zeros
called error correcting codes, embedded within, or resulting from, the
equations of supersymmetry that describe fundamental particles.

The march of technology may well further prove or
disprove the veracity of our reality, as primitive man came from Caves, and we
may soon discover that we are still cave dwellers, pursuing our lives with
artificial meaning in the allegorical Cave that Plato proposed.

The scary downside is that the sheer scale of the weapons
we are capable of manufacturing [with the march of technology] in these times,
can appeal dangerously to the dark-side of human nature. We must also remember
that the dark-side of our natures helped us evolve in the competitive games we
term evolution, for without our dark-side we would never have survived
predation – but today, in so-called civilised society, that dark-side has
dangers when the scale of our weapons are now unspeakable.

So “reality is,
what it is” and we have to navigate it as well as we can, but from time to
time we see things that we cannot explain, things we put down to the randomness
of our reality; coincidences as well as the vagaries of our skills in pattern
recognition [another tool that is necessary for our evolution as a
species].

Last year, when my editor and close friend Mike Stotter
and I went to New
Orleans for Bouchercon 2016, The World Crime and Mystery
Convention, we had a wonderful time, shared with our friends from the genre we
support. Though New Orleans has its own mysteries in its own right, and sure we
drank a lot and partied however some things remain with me, things that made me
think, made me ponder like seeing pixilation of reality, of glitches. I know
many of us are cynical however, like that sensation of Déjà vu, it can also be
unsettling.

One memory that makes me smile is related to a favourite
film of mine. I often make reference to Alex Proyas’ 1998 Dark Cityas it a firm favourite.
During Bouchercon 2016, Mike and I spent a wonderful evening with our friends
Chris Whiteside and Martina Cole. Martina is one Great Britain’s most popular
crime-writers and has been a very dear friend of Mike and I for many years. She
is celebrating her 25th year in publishing and during Bouchercon, she generously
treated Chris, Mike and I to a wonderful dinner and drinks at the Hotel
Monteleone in New Orlean’s French Quarter. I know we consumed a great deal of
Gin, but after a fabulous dinner I felt a little strange which I put down to
the drinking but the feeling was more akin to Déjà vu, and I kept thinking of
the film Dark City and the
significance of this reality. I noticed that the bar-singer start a song that
made me smile. It was the renowned Mexican
song “Sway” and
I quickly grabbed my Iphone to record it for the coincidental line with my
thinking was perplexing.

The
song ‘Sway’ features in Dark City,
with Jennifer Connelly, though the vocal recording was actually with Anita Kelsey. I know it was coincidence that I was thinking
about the Alex Proyas film while seated in the hotel bar in New Orleans, and
maybe the ambience reminded me of that scene with William Hurt and Jennifer
Connelly. Though coupled
to a few other events / coincidences, the memory
still makes me smile; as does the understanding that if we are indeed inside
Plato’s Cave then there are some rules
to make the experience worthwhile.

This
line of thinking will of course narrow itself to whether we take the Blue or Red
Pill, because
as Grace Slick once said with Jefferson Airplane, “one Pill makes you larger and one Pill makes you small”.

Perhaps
next time I will find myself in New Orleans, I will indeed seek out Shell
Beach, because I heard it's the end of the line.

I think I exist, but have no proof except what I write here

Ali Karim - is Assistant Editor at Shots eZine, a contributing editor at January Magazine & The Rap Sheet and writes for Crimespree magazine, Deadly Pleasures and Mystery Readers International and is an associate member of The Crime Writers Association [CWA], International Thriller Writers [ITW] and the Private Eye Writers of America [PWA]. Karim contributed to ‘Dissecting Hannibal Lecter’ ed. Benjamin Szumskyj [McFarland Press] a critical examination of the works of Thomas Harris, as well as The Greenwood Encyclopedia of British Crime Fiction [ed. Barry Forshaw]. Karim has contributed to ITW 100 Thriller Novels due out in 2010.
Karim been three times nominated for a Anthony Award [2007, 2008 & 2009] as well as The Spinetingler Award in 2008 for special contributions to the Crime and Thriller genre.